the sweeping insensitivity of this still life
by SylviaBronte
Summary: Lance receives a call from Bobbi to inform him that Victoria Hand has been found dead, and he immediately goes to check on Isabelle.


**AN: I finally managed to finish this! I intended to finish this all in one night, but it ended up taking me just under a week because the ending refused to be written. Title is taken from 'Hide and Seek' by Imogen Heap. Yes, the 'mmm watcha say' song.**

 **Many thanks to Georgia for encouraging me to finish this!**

* * *

Lance doesn't really know what to expect when he sees an incoming call from 'Hellbeast'. Really, he doesn't even know why he bothered keeping Bobbi's number in his phone anyway. Now that he's gotten out of his phase of getting too drunk to be coherent and calling her to tell her he still cares about her, he honestly sees little point in keeping her number and makes a mental note to delete it.

(Even though, deep down, he knows he'll never be able to do that.)

"Isn't it normally me who calls you?" Lance comments when he picks up the phone, leaning back with a sigh on his comfy bachelor pad sofa. "Because normally, I get absolutely _rat-arsed_ and think it's a bright idea to give you a ring. Which, obviously-..." He pauses suddenly and furrows his brow, listening closely. "Hang on, are you _crying_?"

Bobbi doesn't answer for a few seconds, but he can clearly hear sniffles and the occasional hitch of her breathing.

"Lance, it…" Another sniffle, and the quiet sweep of a tissue across her damp cheeks. "It's Hand. She's dead."

"Hand…" It takes him a second. "As in, Victoria Hand? _Hartley's_ Hand?"

Bobbi sniffles yet again, and her voice shakes when she speaks. "Yeah. She was with a team of agents transferring Garrett to the Fridge, and… and she never touched base. People went to investigate, and she… someone shot her, and all the other agents." her voice goes slightly high-pitched at the end, and she starts properly crying.

Lance is frozen, half in shock and half not quite knowing what to do about the fact that his ex-wife is currently crying her eyes out on the phone to him. He exhales heavily and runs his fingers through his hair, slowly shaking his head.

"Shit… Bobbi, I'm sorry." he says, his tone gentle and sincere. He hasn't spoken to her in such a way since they were married, and he hopes she doesn't pick up on it. "Does she know? Iz, I mean."

"She was the first one I called." The sound changes slightly, and there's a _clack_ when Bobbi sets her phone down on what he imagines must be the table with him on speaker. She blows her nose, and continues. "She didn't say much."

He thinks for a moment, remembering the last time something like this happened. Just under a year after he met Isabelle her mother lost her fight against breast cancer, and he could still remember how she'd reacted. She'd stayed quiet for a while, and eventually broke down after a few glasses of wine back at his apartment following the funeral reception. That was the first time Lance had seen Isabelle cry, and he now dreads to think about how she'll be reacting to her girlfriend's death.

"I'm gonna go over." he decides, getting to his feet and heading to the door. Lance holds the phone between his ear and his shoulder while he reaches out to grab his jacket. "Someone has to make sure she's alright, Mack and Idaho aren't around and I'm assuming you've got enough on your plate. Besides, those two'd be shit in this situation," he continues as he crouches down to put on his shoes. "Idaho would just stand there like an absolute lemon, and Izzy _hates_ it when Mack gives her advice. Says it's like talking to a children's counsellor, or something."

Bobbi snorts at that, and he very faintly hears her dab at her eyes with the tissue again. "I can only imagine."

He sighs, getting to his feet again and scratching the back of his head with his free hand. "You're alright, aren't you?"

"I'm fine." she responds. "Are you?"

"Barely knew her. Always thought she was a bit of a bitch." Lance says frankly.

Bobbi gasps. "Have you never heard of respect for the dead?" She sounds annoyed, and this isn't really an argument he wants to be having right now.

"She'd appreciate my honesty, as opposed to lying through my teeth."

She sighs, exasperated, and he feels as though he's gone too far. _As always_ , he thinks. "Sorry. I'm shit at this. Just… take care, yeah? I've gotta go."

"Yeah," Bobbi exhales slowly. "You too."

"Don't-" _die out there._

He stops quickly, and mentally curses himself for almost slipping out their old parting sentiment. Bobbi, mercifully, says nothing. "Bye." he mumbles after a few awkward seconds.

Lance quickly hangs up the phone, resisting the urge to hurl it across the room and take out his frustrations by slamming his fists into the wall. Instead, he pockets it and mutters profanities under his breath, stepping out into the crisp April air.

* * *

One day about two or three years ago, during a bout of semi-heavy drinking, Isabelle and Lance were relaxing on her sofa with _Two and A Half Men_ on in the background. It took them no time at all to lapse into one of the deep, personal conversations that often came with copious amounts of drinking, and before long they were divulging some of their deepest fears. Lance was sat upright, and Isabelle was leaning back against the arm of the sofa with her legs stretched out over his lap. After a few seconds of silence in their conversation, she took a deep breath.

"I've got kind of a weird one."

"What, a weird fear?"

"Yep," Isabelle drained the rest of her beer, and carelessly dropped the bottle to the carpeted floor.

He'd just shrugged, and briefly glanced over to meet her gaze. "Well, I'm all ears. No judgement here."

She let out a long, worn-out sigh, and blindly reached out to search for another bottle. "Well," she began. "There's always a pretty good chance that we won't come back from an assignment. We've both had enough brushes with death between us to know that."

He'd grimaced at the uncomfortable memories that surfaced, but hadn't say anything.

"It's… God, it's stupid. I know I've got Vic, but if I were to die in the field… what would happen to my apartment? And all my stuff?"

"When you're on an assignment, Iz, that should be the least of your concerns."

"Yeah, I know. That's why it's fucking stupid," she muttered, cracking open the next bottle with her teeth and spitting out the cap. "I just don't know who'd sort everything out."

"I'd probably end up doing it, in all honesty.." Lance replied after a little while, and Isabelle nodded slowly in agreement.

"I want you to have a key to my apartment. In case something goes wrong, in case I fuck up somewhere along the line and I don't come back."

He hadn't quite known what to say to that, but he'd nodded anyway and agreed. A while later, Isabelle had pressed the spare key to her apartment into his hand, and they'd continued drinking in silence.

* * *

It takes him a few minutes to figure out which key is the one for Isabelle's apartment. He's never had to use it before, but she's not answering the door and he knows for a fact she'll be home. Lance isn't _horrendously_ worried, per se, because he knows that Isabelle is too smart to do anything particularly stupid. He remembers, uncomfortably, the one time he woke up in hospital after a particularly long night of drinking to find her crying at his bedside. Of course she'd yelled at him, but there was something quite jarring about the way she'd practically screamed that she didn't even recognise him anymore. It was the push he'd needed to go to his first AA meeting.

Lance sighs in relief when he finally finds the correct key, unlocking and opening the door and stepping inside. Remembering how anal Hand can get about people wearing shoes in the apartment, he quickly stops to toe them off before he remembers. Pausing, slightly conflicted, he kicks them off anyway.

"Iz? It's only me," he called out, knowing she'd likely already reached for her gun upon unexpectedly hearing someone enter the house.

Distantly, he hears the unmistakable sound of a probably-empty bottle landing on the coffee table. Closely followed by what sounds like a muffled sob.

He lets out another heavy sigh, walking in the direction of the living room and stopping in the doorway when he sees her.

Lance hadn't quite known what to expect when he came over, but Isabelle with a cigarette in her mouth after she'd expressed disgust over his own occasional habit so many times was close to the bottom of the list.

And she looks an absolute _mess_. Empty beer bottles and cans cover the coffee table and there are even a few on the floor, and if the amount of smoke in the air is anything to go by this isn't her first cigarette of the day. Her eyes are red and her cheeks are damp, and she slowly turns her head to look at him properly.

"You're lucky you said who you were when you did. I would've shot you, Hunt." she slurs, dropping the gun to the floor and nearly toppling over in the process.

 _Not good_ , he thinks. I _t takes a lot to actually get her slurring her words_.

Lance eventually enters the room and sits down on the arm of the sofa. He watches her for a moment or two before he finds the words to say.

"I'm sorry." he says simply. "Hand was... she was good, Iz."

"You thought she was a bitch, Hunter. Don't go singing her praises now that she's..." She clearly doesn't want to finish the sentence, but he knows what she means.

"Well, yeah, but... what am I supposed to say? Sorry your girlfriend's dead, she was a total bitch and I can't understand how you stayed with her for as long as you did, but-..." Lance stops himself when he hears her start to cry all over again. "Fuck. Sorry, Iz, I..."

"She was the one good thing I had left, Lance." He can't help but furrow his brow when she uses his first name, something she rarely does. In a weird way, it almost reminds him of the gravity of the situation. She takes a long drag of her cigarette. "And now what have I got?"

Lance's immediate default response is to poke fun and act offended that she doesn't seem to think he's a good enough thing in her life to be on par with Hand, but he doesn't say it. "That's not true and you know it, Isabelle." She pulls a face, and stubs out her cigarette in the ash tray. "You've got Jane. She's been in remission for _ages_ now. That's good, isn't it?"

"It'll come back." she mutters darkly. "Our mom's did." Isabelle suddenly gets to her feet and throws her beer bottle at the wall, and the smash makes him nearly jump out of his skin. "Why does everyone I love die?!" she yells. "Everything good just gets taken away! Am I not allowed to be _happy_?"

He pauses, and they lapse into silence.

"You've got me," Lance says quietly. "And I'm not going anywhere, unlucky for you. But you've got Idaho too, and Mack. And believe it or not, Bobbi thinks the world of you."

Isabelle doesn't say anything, staring down at the floor. He watches her for a little while, not quite knowing what to expect, before slowly getting up and going over to experimentally pull her into a tight hug. For a minute or so she is still, a statue made of stone unable to bend to anyone's warmth, but before long she slowly begins to unravel. Her face presses into Lance's neck and she finally lets herself cry without holding back.

He holds her there for the longest time, and they eventually sink to the floor when Isabelle can't hold herself up anymore in her devastated, drunken state. Lance had forgotten how terrible it was when she actually properly cried, and he wasn't particularly enjoying remembering. It's one of the most painful sounds he's ever heard, and he actually wonders if this time is worse than when her mother passed away. She's crying as though her whole world has ended, her entire body shaking as she sobs, and out of nowhere he realises that his own cheeks are damp.

Lance furiously knuckles his eyes and dries his face with his sleeve. He doesn't insult her by telling her that everything will be okay, he instead reminds her that he's there and he's got her. Isabelle would normally just tell him to shut up and stop being so sentimental, but it's what she needs to hear right now and they both know it.

After what feels like hours her sobs slowly begin to subside, eventually waning to pitiful hiccups and sniffles. He waits for her to break the hold first, and when she does, he sits back on his heels and watches her closely.

It seems to sober her up, having a long cry. She reaches for the bottle with much more deliberation this time, but he catches her wrist and shakes his head.

"Come on, Iz. Bed time. I'm cutting you off."

"But I need it…"

"No, you don't." _You're not like me_ , he adds in his head.

Lance doesn't really give her much of a chance to protest again. He hauls Isabelle to her feet, quickly throwing an arm around her waist when she stumbles and threatens to fall. He's honestly thankful that she isn't threatening to be sick, he does _not_ want to have to deal with vomit right now and she's clearly had so much that he's scared she'd never stop if she started. She's so far the only woman to ever drink him under the table, which he thinks is impressive but also concerning given the amount of alcohol he can handle.

"Want Vic…" Isabelle mumbles, and it damn near breaks his heart.

"I know, Izzy."

Alcohol is a depressant, he remembers. He knows from firsthand experience that they're both susceptible to it. Lance fully expects Isabelle to sleep through the night, but tomorrow most likely won't be a walk in the park. She's still drunkenly mumbling about Hand when he manages to get her into bed, but she abruptly stops when he gets up and turns for the door.

"Don't go."

Lance furrows his brow and turns around, honestly thinking he'd never heard Isabelle say those words. Not to him, anyway. She's starting to drift off already, so he wouldn't have to stay with her for too long anyway. Her face is grief-stricken and drawn, she looks like an empty shell and it's honestly a bit unsettling.

"Yeah… yeah, okay. I'll stay for a bit."

His words seem to reassure her, and he moves over to sit on the other side of the bed that he presumes is actually Isabelle's if the way she's hugging the other pillow to her chest and breathing in the scent is anything to go by. She's threatening to cry again, he can see it in her eyes, and he instinctively reaches out to run his fingers through her hair. While he'd never normally do something like that for anyone (except maybe Bobbi back before it all went to shit), and Isabelle would never normally allow herself to take comfort in such a thing, it soothes her and she closes her eyes.

Lance waits for the telltale change in her breathing before he gets up and goes to get himself one of the remaining bottles of beer. He sits down again and cracks it open with his teeth, just like she always does, spits the cap off to the side and drinks. The icy bitterness of the beer draws a sigh from his lips, and he leans back against the wooden headboard. When Isabelle shifts in her sleep and makes a quiet noise he returns his hand to her hair, continuing to drink.

"Here's to you, Vic." he mumbles, raising his already half empty bottle. "I'll take care of her."

He eventually falls asleep at her side, propped up against the headboard with the empty beer bottle held in his lap and his fingers tangled in her hair. The thin curtains dance on the gentle but cool spring breeze, and the night is still.


End file.
